Cullman Center Institute for Teachers Past Programs

Mary Gaitskill, one of America’s master short story writers, leads a seminar on four brilliant stories: The 5:48 by John Cheever; Vandals by Alice Munro; Everything That Rises Must Converge by Flannery O'Connor; and The End of FIRPO in the World by George Saunders. The class will discuss each work's apparent theme, style, and representation of character, and will pay special attention to the ways writers use words to create non-verbal experience through which readers sense the hidden and irrational 

CHRIS ADRIAN, Instructor

This workshop will examine the unconventional language used in a number of stories, including short fiction by Donald Barthelme and Judy Budnitz, to create a drama of romantic attachment that resists and overcomes cliché. Participants will also engage in a writing exercise that incorporates some of these elements to produce an affecting piece of writing about love. 

Chris Adrian is the author of three novels – The Great Night, Gob's Grief, and The Children's Hospital –  and a collection of 

ADAM SHATZ, Instructor

As a prominent poet, critic, essayist, playwright, and editor, LeRoi Jones (later known as Amiri Baraka), bridged the worlds of the Beats, the New York School, and avant-garde jazz, and did more than anyone to define the new black aesthetic. Readings will include several essays and poems as well as Jones’s short play, Dutchman. Seminar participants will also listen to samples of music by jazz artists who were close to Jones, and look at paintings by Bob Thompson, who documented that world 

SHAMUS KHAN, Instructor

Relevant for history as well as English teachers, this seminar will focus on the social world portrayed in The Great Gatsby. Fitzgerald set his novel at the end of the Gilded Age, a time of staggering new wealth, staunchly-held prejudices, deep underlying inequalities, and a heady sense of promise. Will the bubble of the 1920s collapse? Will anything ultimately change?

The author of Privilege: The Making of an Adolescent Elite at St. Paul’s School, Shamus Khan teaches sociology at

DARRYL PINCKNEY, Instructor

The Autobiography of Malcolm X has surprisingly wide appeal as a coming-of-age story, perhaps because of its message of spiritual growth and intellectual change. But Malcolm X also became an icon of militant defiance. How can his book represent such a contradictory legacy? What about this controversial tale continues to fascinate? What would young women find in it? Does it carry the same message for black youth as for white?

An essayist and novelist, Darryl Pinckney is the author of the novel High Cotton and Out 

EVAN HAEFELI, Instructor

Using the famous case of Henry Hudson’s ‘discovery of New York,’ the seminar will reflect on this crucial moment in American history. We will use primary and secondary sources, both European and indigenous, to build perspectives on this foundational experience and illustrate how interpretations of the past belong to our present.

Evan Haefeli teaches history at Columbia

BEN KATCHOR, Instructor

Through a series of writing and drawing exercises, we will explore the possibilities of expression that arise when text and image are combined on the page. Participants will discover and amplify, through their writing, the stories suggested by their drawings, and analyze, through their drawing, the descriptive passages in their written texts. No previous drawing experience is necessary, but everyone will be asked to make the attempt.

Ben Katchor’s latest graphic novel is The Cardboard Valise. The 

THIS IS A WEEK-LONG SEMINAR (MONDAY JULY 16 - FRIDAY JULY 20)

ADAM SHATZ, Instructor

From the late 1950s through the mid-1960s, New York below 14th Street was home to a thriving -- and increasingly politicized -- black bohemian scene. Black writers, painters, and jazz musicians moved downtown in search of cheaper rents and a more tolerant racial atmosphere, and were soon mixing with their white counterparts in bookshops, taverns, and jazz clubs. By 1965, the scene had imploded, with the assassination of Malcolm X and the rise of black nationalism. 

THIS IS A WEEK-LONG SEMINAR (MONDAY JULY 23 - FRIDAY JULY 27) 

LAURA SHAPIRO, Instructor

A wide range of literary genres is open to writers who are deeply curious about food and who find it a peerless– in fact, irresistible – window onto history, experience, and character. This seminar will be held in conjunction with “Lunch Hour: NYC,” a major exhibition of food-related items from the Library’s collections, and will examine the work of such influential culinary storytellers as MFK Fisher, Anthony Bourdain, and Laurie 

THIS IS A WEEK-LONG SEMINAR (MONDAY JULY 30 - FRIDAY AUGUST 3)

RIVKA GALCHEN, Instructor

Shakespeare wrote soliloquies in iambic pentameter; Freud composed some of the 20th century’s best writing in the form of medical case histories; Elvis turned gospel into rock ’n roll; and Dr. Seuss wrote Green Eggs and Ham on a bet that he could write a book using just fifty different words. A narrow passage allows the wind to whistle-- at least sometimes! We’ll read texts by Kobo Abe, Roberto Bolaño, Anthony Burgess, and others, 

JAMES RYERSON, Instructor

This seminar, of interest to economics, social studies, and English teachers, presents a case study of the editing of a feature article in The New York Times Magazine. Before the seminar, participants will read both the first draft and the final version of the article, a profile by Stephen Mihm about the economist, Nouriel Roubini. During the morning seminar, the group will discuss why the piece was assigned, what the reporting challenges were, and how the writer and editor worked 

DÁNIEL MARGÓCSY, Instructor

How did Europeans make sense of the expanding globe in the Age of Discoveries? This seminar explores the impact of the printing revolution on Europeans’ perceptions of America, Africa, and Asia in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. We will examine how, in the absence of first-hand evidence, Europeans attempted to make sense of the contradictory accounts of travelers. And we will look at early maps, broadsheets, paintings, and printed texts to see how a highly stereotypical 

 SHIMON DOTAN, Instructor

This seminar, helpful for global history teachers as well as any teacher who uses film in the classroom, looks closely at one of the most influential political films in history. The Battle of Algiers (1966), by Gillo Pontecorvo, recreates the Algerian struggle for independence from the French in the 1950s. Children shoot soldiers at point-blank range, women plant bombs in cafés, and French soldiers resort to torture to break the will of the insurgents. The film is a case study in 

This seminar is during spring break

GARY PANTER, Instructor

Starting a sketchbook can seem intimidating. This workshop will address the activity of regularly drawing in a sketchbook. People at any skill level will benefit from this workshop, but it is aimed at those who don’t draw but would like to. Participants will do easy, satisfying exercises designed for the beginner. Bring in a favorite poem or two — at the end of the workshop you’ll draw illustrations for the poems.

Gary Panter is a painter, 

This seminar is during spring break

SAЇD SAYRAFIEZADEH, Instructor

How exactly do you take those raw, unwieldy—often embarrassing—personal experiences (also known as your life) and fashion a compelling narrative? By studying the various strategies that established writers such as Tobias Wolff and A. M. Homes have employed in writing memoir, we will explore the genre in relation to traditional storytelling—character, plot, arc, and resolution. And we’ll ask the essential question: does 

THIS IS A WEEK-LONG SEMINAR (MONDAY JULY 15 - FRIDAY JULY 19)

GARY PANTER, Instructor

This class is designed for beginners, but artists at any skill level are welcome to apply. Our primary focus will be on learning how to draw in a sketchbook. Through simple exercises, we will break down the barrier separating non-drawers from drawers. Each day's draughting will be supplemented with lectures on a variety of topics, such as the history of comics and drawing; 

THIS IS A WEEK-LONG SEMINAR (MONDAY JULY 22 - FRIDAY JULY 26)

SHIMON DOTAN, Instructor

THIS IS A WEEK-LONG SEMINAR (JULY 29 - AUGUST 2)

JOHN WRAY, Instructor